What a Fool Believes

I decided to write about What a Fool Believes, and then remembered that I'd noted its title as a a draft possibility of a song to write about twice before in the last 15 years.

I've never been able to make up my mind about it. I'm not sure there's another song that I both like and dislike so much at the same time.

I remember there were a few Michael McDonald songs that used to get a fair amount of airplay on Capital and Virgin in the 80s and 90s - On My Own, I Keep Forgetting, Yah Mo B There, Sweet Freedom, and I didn't like any of them, and I didn't like his voice. I couldn't work out quite what it was meant to achieve. I guess they were called blue-eyed soul and yacht rock, and I didn't like either of those things. 

That's how I felt when I first What a Fool Believes. In fact I probably disliked it, initially, more than the rest. But not for long.

First of all, though, who is the song by? It was co-written by Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald, and, in fact, Loggins released his version first, but it's the McDonald version which is the classic one, though, in fact, it's not credited as Michael McDonald, it's the Doobie Brothers, who he was singing for.

There are a few other versions going about. When I first thought to myself "I like this song, but i wonder if there's some better version without the bits I struggle with", i discovered there was an Aretha Franklin version, but in fact, that's not good at all, far too 80s.

After quietly deciding, in around 2000, that I actually quite liked this song, I remember playing it to my flatmates Alex and John. This was NOT the kind of thing we were into, so I knew I was exposing myself to ridicule, and sure enough, the united response was "Jesus, that's awful" and we did not get to the end of the song and the moment was not spoken of again.

I should note that there are loads of cheesy soft-rock anthems I comfortably enjoy unambiguously now, but my slight uneasiness with What a Fool Believes remains.

And yet I have returned to it down the years.

I've been talking around the song, rather than talking about it, so far. What's the bad bit? What's the good bit?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKYQNtF11eg&list=RDqKYQNtF11eg&start_radio=1

The answer's quite simple, for me. The "bad bit", the bit I've never been able to fully get over, is the start, the plinky plonky intro, almost like a a child's toy, so time-dated and hard to take seriously, then even the over-involved opening verse 

"tryin' hard to recreate what had yet to be created; once in her life she musters a smile for his nostalgic tale". 

Oof, it feels pretty cumbersome, both lyrically and melodically.

But then, the good bit, the song transitions to something magical. Apparently, that's the bit Kenny Loggins had at the start of the songwriting process, where the vocalist goes to their upper range "She had a place in his life, he never made her think twice", a lovely mid-verse hook.

And, then, the bit I really love, a lightning-in-a-bottle piece of brilliant songwriting/performance.

The song settles, drops, again

"As he rises to her apology ..."

There are so many things I love about the next few seconds of the song 

- the fluency, the fact that each line follows on perfectly from the next, but increases the stakes, the drama and the universality.

- the actual wisdom of it. How many songs are such a gentle, but profound, admonition, of a man in what i believe the kids call the "friend zone", topped off by its own little epigram "what a fool believes he sees no wise man has the power to reason away"? Alright, Confucius! [i should say, for years, I thought it was ""the" wise man" not "no wise man", which can be made to mean roughly the same thing, but "no wise man ..." is definitely better ...

- and McDonald's vocal, which really comes in its own here. It has a kindness and a world-weary sweetness to it here, an older brother admitting he's been the fool himself and trying to stop the subject from making a fool of himself. Of course, alongside that, the song only works, the hook only takes hold because McDonald has spectacular range.

So, there we go, What a Fool Believes - there's a section of it which I genuinely think is one of the best sections of music and lyrics that exists, but I can never quite escape from the cheesy backdrop*. No wise man has the power to reason it away.

* this reminds me a bit of Firework by Katy Perry, which has a terrible, nondescript verse which, as far as i'm concerned, serves only to set up the monster chorus ...

England men's footballers of last 40 years

Another list.

It's pretty much 40 years since I started watching England play international football. Let's round it up to 40.

So, this list is - 

All the male footballers with over 40 caps who have played since the 1986 World Cup. 

There are over 60 of them.

I am going to leave out four; Kenny Sansom, Ray Wilkins, Glenn Hoddle, Chris Woods - the first three because, though I remember very well seeing them play club football in their later years, I honestly can't quite remember them playing for England in all but the sketchiest detail - their distinguished international careers were all nearly entirely before 1986. Those three were all great footballers. The other one, Chris Woods, I have less excuse for not remembering, but, really, I can't place myself properly watching him, even though he was England's first choice keeper at Euro 92. He was second choice to Shilton for a long time, played a lot of his career at Rangers, was clearly a very solid keeper, but I just can't quite do justice to anything I remember him doing.

There are some pretty notable England footballers of this era with fewer than 40 caps - Nicky Butt, Ashley Young, McManaman, Dele Alli, Trevor Steven, Ian Wright, Viv Anderson, Sturridge, Vardy, Merson, and a few others, as well as a few  who haven't got there yet but probably will - Alexander-Arnold, Luke Shaw, Guehi, Grealish, not to mention the likes of Cole Palmer.

Key parameters - 

-I'm only going to include what they did from 1986 onwards. A couple of England legends will be significantly downgraded because of that.

-This is about how they were for England, not how good a footballer they were. Indeed, if they were a particularly good footballer who never quite fulfilled their promise for England, that will count against them.

- They've all got 40+ caps. They're good enough footballers to keep getting picked for a Top 10 football nation. So, there won't be that much fun in "ha, this guy was rubbish". Most of them are good, and consequently quite hard to differentiate. But, maybe there are a couple of slightly rubbish ones at the bottom ...

There are other reasons it is quite tricky to make solid judgements on this - "Playing well for England" mainly means standing out in major tournaments. Having a few decent games in qualifiers and friendlies just ends up not mattering much. And, obviously, England have failed in major tournaments, though not that badly. So there's not actually that much to go on... but so be it.

There are a few phases, roughly -

86-90 good.

Early 90s bad.

96-2006 pretty good.

2007-2016 bad.

2017-present, very good.

With a few exceptions, that holds pretty well. So obviously players who mainly played in the good eras will mainly be judged higher than those from the not-good eras. 

Let's start.

61. Phil Neville. Has more England caps than Paul Gascoigne, remarkably. Was rarely a first choice, was usually not picked for tournaments, and when he was, in 2000, was responsible for England going out in the group stages. In his later career, he showed he was a really good mid-table midfielder, but, as a fill-in defender, there's no way he deserved to play 59 times for England.

60. Phil Jagielka. Another pretty good player who played more for England than he should have, and was found wanting when he was picked in the main XI.

59. James Milner. More a reflection on England than him. Could easily have 150 caps. As it is, had 46 for the U21s, 61 for the senior side, but was generally treated as an afterthought, so retired from international duty early, after which he played his best club football. Never really did anything notable for England.

58. Glen Johnson. Just a real symbol of the not-good era, remember him being exposed in some big games.

57. Gary Cahill. Truthfully, I veered away from watching England much between 2010 and 2013. It had just all been so crap for so long. So perhaps this is unfair on Gary Cahill, but it just was not a great era.

56. Kieran Trippier. And perhaps this is unfair on Kieran Trippier, who did after all score a magnificent goal for England in an actual World Cup semi-final, but, I don't know, he was just so rubbish, so hopelessly mind-numbingly out of position and ideas, in the 2024 Euros...

55. Phil Foden. As was he. He kept on almost getting there, almost doing something good, at which point the floodgates may have opened, but it didn't happen.

54. David James. Was hardly ever first choice, and was always likely to make a mistake, but, to be fair, looking at his record, did actually keep a few clean sheets in major tournaments.

53. Gareth Barry. Just the memory of the German attacks flying past him in 2010.

52. Joe Hart. Was not good in both 2014 and 2016, and his career never really recovered.

51. Emile Heskey. Had his moments, did the job.

50. Peter Shilton. Yes, yes, I know Peter Shilton was best goalkeeper in the world etc, but he was already 36 by 1986. and he made key mistakes, legendary mistakes, both that year and in 1990. There was no way he was England's best keeper during that era. I'd watch David Seaman and John Lukic on the TV and presumed the latter must be ineligible and the former, well, I don't know. But Seaman should have been playing for England throughout the late 80s and the whole 90s.

49. Martin Keown.

48. Eric Dier.

47. David Batty. A quite good player, forever to be associated with Kevin Keegan's "Yes" ... oh no

46. Gareth Southgate.

45. Theo Walcott. Did score one magnificent hat-trick, but it is hard to remember much else.

44. Bryan Robson. Well, I know this is going to seem like nonsense. as Robson was widely and clearly known as England's best player of the 80s, and his record reflects that, but, the fact is, he got injured early in both 86 and 90 World Cups and England were better afterwards, he played three games in Euro 88 and England lost all three. 

43. Chris Waddle. One of my favourite ever players, and almost did it for England, but, of course, and famously, didn't ...

42. Danny Welbeck. Was really actually pretty good for England. 16 goals in 42 games.

41. Jermaine Defoe. Likewise, scored 1 in 3 for England as he scored 1 in 3 throughout his club career.

40. Mark Wright. Was very good, as I recall, in the 1990 World Cup.

39. Owen Hargreaves. Was really disliked by England fans for quite a few years, then was the team's best player at the 2006 World Cup, just by virtue of working hard and being smart (exposing, dare i say it, some more vaunted midfielders). Injuries meant he didn't play much more after that.

38. Gary Neville. Gary Neville was quite good, but only ever quite good.

37. Teddy Sheringham. Had some fairly glorious moments.

36. Paul Robinson. I really stick up for Paul Robinson. Conceded very few goals for England and truly i think McClaren bowing to public pressure and dropping him for the decisive qualifier in 2007 vs Croatia cost England a place in the 2008 World Cup.

35. Des Walker. Des Walker had about 50 games for England when he was one of the best defenders in the world, but then it all ended a bit disastrously, making three big mistakes which cost England badly for the 1994 WC.

34. John Barnes. Although people will say Barnes' England career was a relative disappointment, and it surely was, he still almost turned round a World Cup quarter-final, and produced a fair few other great moments (including scoring one of the best goals ever in 84), all thw while dealing with his own fans being massively racist to him.

33. Marcus Rashford.

32. Peter Beardsley.

31. Peter Crouch. Now, I think the question 'Of these strikers who all scored more than 20 goals for England a) Wayne Rooney b) Michael Owen c) Peter Crouch d) Alan Shearer, which of them did so at the highest goals-per-game average?' is a pretty enlightening one ...

30. Jordan Henderson.

29. Declan Rice. Was not quite his best at Euro 24. Couldn't quite make it tick. Still think he could be more daring.

28. Bukayo Saka.

27. Terry Butcher. Strong imagery.

26. Paul Ince. Also strong imagery.

25. Tony Adams.

24. Joe Cole. Prodigiously gifted, full of flair and ability to change a game, scored a stunning volley in a major tournament - 10 goals in 56 games for England. This almost exactly describes Paul Gascoigne's England career, but Cole had a much more substantial club career, and yet I'd imagine literally no one thinks Cole was Gascoigne's equal. Funny, isn't it ...

23. Jude Bellingham. I do slightly worry, though, that there'll always be something slightly incompatible about Bellingham. I don't think him and Kane works at all, but I also see it a bit at Real ... I think he takes up other people's space, just like ...

22. Steven Gerrard. Why did England go from so much promise in 2001 to so rotten by 2011 ... o i don't know...

21. Harry Maguire.

20. Paul Scholes. 

19. John Terry.

18. Stuart Pearce.

17. Frank Lampard. Never the problem.

16. David Seaman. A great keeper in his prime. His England career should have run from 86 to 2000 (not 2003), should have played 140 games or so.

15. Alan Shearer.

14. Wayne Rooney. It's hard with Rooney, he had one great tournament, but the fact is 2006, 08, 10, 12, 14, 16, none of them went well for him. That's a lot of big opportunities missed.

13. David Platt. 27 goals in 62 games from midfield. Probably the most forgotten player in England football history., both at international and club level.

12. Michael Owen.

11. Kyle Walker. Really, Kyle Walker being able to run really fast was probably one of the three key reasons England were so successful in the last 10 years.

10. John Stones.

9. Sol Campbell.

8. Raheem Sterling. The actual best player in an actual major tournament, after all.

7. David Beckham.

6. Jordan Pickford. Has not made a single big mistake across four major tournaments, has saved penalties, He has weaknesses - distribution, shots from distance - but has done absolutely as well as he possibly could.

5. Paul Gascoigne. Even I am not immune to the romanticism of having Gascoigne this high. Was he actually that good in 90 or 96 ... maybe not really, but almost ...

4. Rio Ferdinand. I actually, in about 2008, did a statistical study in just how much better England were when Rio Ferdinand was on the pitch than when he wasn't. The difference was staggering. Ferdinand only played in two tournaments for England - the 2002 and 2006 World Cups, due to various misadventures. I genuinely think, in his prime years, he was as good as any centre back has been.

3. Gary Lineker

2. Ashley Cole If anything, Ashley Cole has gone to being a bit over-revered now, it's not like he was perfect, but he was a very good defender for England.

1. Harry Kane. Obviously, by any measure.

101 Songs again and again

Right, I seem to put a list of my 101 Favourite Songs on here every five years or so, and the time has come round again.

Obviously, I've done countless sub-lists in the intervening period, but nice to go back to basics with no parameters.

Apple Music recently offered me my 100 Most Listened To songs of the last 10 years, so here, in the link, is that for comparison. Obviously, that has a significant weighting towards the toddler tyranny of the Disney years, which my own list, mainly, will not.

https://music.apple.com/gb/playlist/replay-all-time/pl.rp-bwCb43xN

There is a lot in common, of course. I tend to listen to songs I like. I think, more than usual, I've included passing fancies in this list as much as longstanding favourites, so probably when I look again in five years there'll be a few were I'll wonder what the hell that's doing there ...

Anyway, here's the list. No big surprises, I'd have thought ...

1. From the Morning - Nick Drake
2. When the Haar Rolls In - James Yorkston
3. Can't Do Much -Waxahatchee
4. Pa'lante - Hurray for the Riff-Raff
5. Take It With Me - Tom Waits
6. Something Like Happiness - The Maccabees
7. All My Friends - LCD Soundsystem
8. In California - Joanna Newsom
9. She's Your Lover Now (Take 16) - Bob Dylan
10. Diamonds - Rihanna
11. Impossible Germany (Live) - Wilco
12. Doo Wop (That Thing) - Lauryn Hill
13. Caravan (Live) - Van Morrison
14. Head Rolls Off - Frightened Rabbit
15. Fourth of July - Sufjan Stevens
16. Witness (1 Hope) - Roots Manuva
17. Being Alive (from Company)
18. My Baby Don't Understand Me - Natalie Prass
19. A Matter of Time - The Leisure Society
20. Love It If We Made It (Live) - The 1975
21. Ruby Falls - Waxahatchee
22. Place to Be - Nick Drake
23. Yes - McAlmont and Butler
24. Dancing on My Own - Robyn
25. Surf - Roddy Frame
26. Losing You - Solange
27. Grace - Jeff Buckley
28. Ignore Tenderness - Julia Jacklin
29. Song for Our Daughter - Laura Marling
30. Famous Blue Raincoat - Leonard Cohen
31. The Mercy Seat (Live) - Nick Cave
32. Would I Lie to You? - Charles and Eddie
33. Good Luck, Babe - Chappell Roan
34. Better Son/Daughter - Rilo Kiley
35. Isis (Live) - Bob Dylan
36. Angela Surf City -The Walkmen
37. Rise to Me - The Decemberists
38. The Only Living Boy in New York - Simon and Garfunkel
39. She's a Jar - Wilco
40. I See a Darkness - Johnny Cash/Bonnie Prince Billy
41. Rainy Night in Soho - The Pogues
42. Thunder Road - Bruce Springsteen
43. The Wild Kindness - Silver Jews
44. No Children - Mountain Goats
45. Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love - Kara Jackson
46. With Every Heartbeat - Robyn
47. The Modern Leper - Frightened Rabbit
48. Moon River - Audrey Hepburn
49. The Rat - The Walkmen
50. Sultans of Swing - Dire Straits
51. Hummingbird - Wilco
52. Downtown Train - Tom Waits
53. The Place Where He Inserted the Blade - Black Country, New Road
54. St Elmo's Fire - John Parr
55. She's Got You High - Mumm-Ra
56. Rise - Josh Rouse
57. Au Fond Du Temple Saint - Jussi Bjoerling
58. Alyosha - Susanne Sundfor
59. Danny Callahan - Conor Oberst
60. Green Light - Lorde
61. Redemption Song - Bob Marley
62. Blind Willie McTell - Bob Dylan
63. Under the Westway - Blur
64. Slow Life - SFA
65. Sally MacLennane - The Pogues
66. Stars - Simply Red
67. The Dark is Rising - Mercury Rev
68. Like a Prayer - Madonna
69. Dollar Days - David Bowie
70. Idiot Wind - Bob Dylan
71. Don't Let Go (Love) - En Vogue
72. You've Got a Friend - Carole King
73. So Now What - The Shins
74. The Way You Look Tonight - Frank Sinatra
75. All My Happiness is Gone - Purple Mountains
76. Killing in the Name - Rage Against the Machine
77. Modern Girl - Sleater-Kinney
78. There Must Be an Angel - Eurythmics
79. Right Back to It - Waxahatchee ft MJ Lenderman
80. Young Hearts Run Free - Candi Staton
81. Iceblink Luck - Cocteau Twins
82. Two Princes - Spin Doctors
83. Suite: Judy Blue Eyes - Crosby Stills and Nash
84. A Woman of Heart and Mind - Joni Mitchell
85. In the End - Linkin Park
86. Chicago - Sufjan Stevens
87. How Far I'll Go (from Moana)
88. Save It for Later - The Beat
89. Sunday - Let's Eat Grandma
90. My Girl - The Temptations
91. Danko/Manuel - Drive-By Truckers
92. Carey - Joni Mitchell
93. Takeover - Jay-Z
94. Werewolf - Fiona Apple
95. Nutmeg - Ghostface Killah ft RZA
96. Llorando - Rebekah Del Rio
97. Party Fears Two - The Associates
98. Back to the Radio - Porridge Radio
99. Still Life - Suede
100. Paper Planes - MIA
101. Bryte Side - Pernice Brothers

Ars Gratia ...

Went to see a little work of art you might of heard of called the Mona Lisa last week. I say "see" ... more like catch the top of it from about 25m away over a sea of camera phones. But that's fine with me, we saw it and I can tick it off. I'm vey much from the tick-it-off school of art.

My favourite painting is a little work of art you may heard of called The Starry Night. When I saw it, I hadn't really fully 100% consciously made the connection between the song Vincent and an actual painting called The Starry Night and I turned a corner in MOMA straight into it, and it really was one of my few "well, holy shit, there's that" moments with a painting. I like that it looks a bit like a child's painting. Well, anyway, I like a lot about it.

My sweet spot with art is probably around 1885-1950. I wonder, if you tried to equate ages of art with ages of music, how one would do it. Would the impressionists be 60s rock'n'roll? Da Vinci Mozart? Doesn't really work at all does it? Maybe someone could make it work ...

Anyway, though I like to tick off art, I do also like to look at it, and the people I've most enjoyed looking at, I think are

Van Gogh

Malevich

Durer

Mondrian

Seurat

Bosch

Miro

Waterhouse

Rothko

and of course Bob Dylan!

Just kidding there. I've had a few people tell me Bob Dylan's paintings art is not good, though some critics will say it is actually pretty good. I think it's pretty variable, I do think some of his paintings show some aptitude, but the interesting thing with Bob Dylan's art, as may come out a bit more after his death, is, well, look ... reading Heylin's exhaustive and exhausting biography and a few other things, Dylan has a relationship to not giving people what they think they're getting which is quite dazzling. I suspect were he not one of the great American artists he would be one of the great American white collar criminals ... as it is, maybe he's both, who knows...

anyway, art, you should try it, it can be good ...

Lucy Bronze

It strikes me that Lucy Bronze is, clearly and obviously, one of the greatest sportspeople in British history.

As much as it is extremely pleasing that Chloe Kelly learnt her magnificent technique on the mean streets of Ealing, most of my emotions at the end of Sunday's game were attached to Bronze, who is a quite remarkable person.

Lucia Roberta Tough Bronze - you couldn't make up a name like that. Somehow each word in it tells a story.

Let's start with the football. The scale of Bronze's accomplishment has no comparison in British football.

She was won nine league titles (with five different clubs), five Champions Leagues, two major international tournaments whilst runner-up in another, she was been in the FIFA World XI 7 times, she has been the best (or second best) player in a World Cup (2019), been judged the FIFA Best Player in the World.

No one else in Britain has a record, as an individual and as a team-member, like that - the closest is Bobby Charlton, who won the league three times, the European Cup once, the World Cup, won the Ballon d'Or (and was nominated several more times.)

That is across all of men's and women's football. That's the bare bones of it. There have been more brilliant players, perhaps, whether it's Kelly Smith or Lauren Hemp, Bale or Best, but no one else has won so much nor been judged, so regularly, so close to the top of the game.

Although not a genius of football like Aitana Bonmati, it is also not right to see Bronze just in terms of character and application. At her best, as in the 2019 World Cup, she was a joke, just the best player on any pitch she was on, a computer game character picking the ball up at one end of the pitch and running past everyone else to the other end before pinging a cross in. Injuries have meant she's a little past that now, but still, her athleticism, nous, strength, will, technique, made her one of the best players of the 2025 tournament. England would not have won without her - certainly not the quarter-final vs Sweden, where her goal and penalty were the key moments in the game.

So, those are things people will remember of her from the 2025 tournament. Oh yes, that, and strapping up her own leg on the pitch like a medical pro. Oh yes, and the fact she revealed at the end she'd played the whole tournament with a broken tibia.

Look, I've broken a tibia, and while I can safely assume her tibia was not broken like the great schism of my broken tibia, we can also say that that's pretty ... impressive.

And in character. There's a lot of detail to Lucy Bronze. She can speak four languages. Her father is Portuguese, her mother from Northumberland - she grew up mainly on Holy Island, also Alnwick, but also spent time in Faro - a good combo. When she was young, she was also county champion in cross-country. hockey and tennis. She might have been an 800m runner. She also won awards in maths. In 2013, at university, she wrote her dissertation on ACL injuries on women's sport, which is probably one of the most important issues in all of women's football. At the 2023 World Cup, she won everyone's eternal respect by refusing to shake the hand of football's grotesque head honcho Gianni Infantino, after some entirely typical remarks he made about women's football.

She recently revealed that she is autistic and has ADHD. Years ago, I remember speaking with my wife about people in sport with autism, wondering if many of the qualities associated with autism might lend themselves very well to high achievement in some sports. When we looked it up at the time (probably around 2012) we found that there were basically no high-level sportspeople who were openly autistic.

In the last decade or so, the dialogue and understanding on ASD and ADHD has changed a fair bit, but still, for one of the top sportspeople in the world, who is known for being very protective of their personal life, to speak up, was, I think, pretty powerful and groundbreaking.

In her initial interview, there was huge insight into how someone neurodiverse, or even just someone who struggles socially, might attempt, and succeed, to integrate into the often extremely intimidating and baffling world of team sports.

I mean, imagine how important that is, or can be ...

Anyway, that's all, really. I think Lucy Bronze is the hero a lot of young people need.

Save It for Later

Talking of music on The Bear, this song, Save it for Later, appears several times, either in the original version by The Beat, or covered by Eddie Vedder.

It's a song that had somehow passed me by until the last year or so. To be fair, it was not a big hit single nor was it ever played on the radio. The whole story of it is pretty interesting.

The Beat were (certainly in my perception of them) primarily a ska group, a multiracial band who had a few hits but were a notch below The Specials and Madness in success.

Dave Wakeling, the lead singer, wrote Save it for Later before the band even began, but the bassist Dave Steele did not want it released it by the band as he felt it was too "classic rock". Eventually, it was only on their third (and last) album, and at the insistence of the record company, that it got recorded and released.

The tuning is DADAAD, which is, apparently, pretty unusual, and only came about by mistake because Wakeling was trying to tune to DADGAD. Wakeling recounts that he once got a phone call from Pete Townshend and David Gilmour asking how the tuning worked. It is one of Townshend's favourite songs, and he recorded it and played it in concert.

It has also been covered by Counting Crows and Pearl Jam, and has gradually become The Beat's most popular song. I've never been a fan of Pearl Jam (one of those bands, like The Beat, that are near what I like but have just always passed me by) but the version by Vedder on The Bear is lovely, and really brings something out in the song.

The song has been a complete earworm for me for the last month - I really can't get it out of my head, but it's one of those specific earworms (do you know the ones) where I also can't quite get it completely into my head either. I guess, perhaps, because of the song's unusual tuning, I have real trouble pinning it down exactly when I recall it. Perhaps by writing about it here I will put that to bed. Anyway, here are The Beat and Vedder versions.

Save it for Later - The Beat

Save It for Later - Eddie Vedder

It's a pretty perfect song, I think - intriguing, somehow profound, but also joyous and catchy. 

The Bear

'The Bear' is one of my favourite TV shows of the last few years, but, unlike most other things I love, I can understand without hesitation why some people might not like it so much. Because The Bear is above all a vibe, a vibe for people like me, and however well written or acted it is, I think the vibe is the main reason I love it.

I first heard about The Bear when I saw US music journalists talking about it on Twitter. They were talking about the fact it had used Wilco songs, at length, twice in the same series. I immediately thought "This is the show for me"

The Bear is for men who love Wilco. There is a lot of music in The Bear, not all of which is by Wilco, most of which I love, and it does not sound as if it was carefully designed by committee, it sounds like it is one or two middle-aged guys' favourite songs.

There are other things that are good about The Bear too. From early on, it has had utterly believable interactions between its characters - the chemistry (or, presumably, actually, level of rehearsal and skill) is outstanding. 

For me, the key character is Tina, played by Liza Colon-Zayas, a supporting character who is a middle-aged line cook. The screen has always crackled when Tina is on it. She holds the past and the future of the restaurant. 

Seasons 1 and 2 of The Bear had universal acclaim, whereas 3 had more mixed reviews. So did 4, which surprised me, as I thought 4 was as good as 1 and 2. Perhaps I am biased because Season 3 was the only one that didn't have Wilco on the soundtrack. Big mistake. In any case, what I was going to say was that even though 3 had a few issues, going too hard on Bear tropes and overegging the cuteness of some supporting-character comedy, it had a few outstanding episodes, none better than the one that focused on Tina's "origin story" - one of the best ever Bear episodes.

Although they have become famous, most of the main actors in The Bear were not particularly famous before it started. On the other hand, one of the features has been the litany of famous faces in cameo roles. Or rather, cameo roles is not quite right. They start off looking like they're going to be cameos and then end up being regular supporting roles. In Season 1, that was just Oliver Platt as Jimmy. The regularity of a genuine star turning up once and then again has increased from there - Jamie Lee Curtis, Bob Odenkirk, Josh Hartnett (one that seemed like a slightly jarring in cameo in Season 3, but became a really nice supporting performance in Season 4), Olivia Colman, Will Poulter, Sarah Paulsen, John Mulaney, Rob Reiner, Danielle Deadwyler, Brie Larsen, not to mention Jon Bernthal in flashback, as Mikey, Carmen's brother, whose suicide underpins everything.

There are also appearances from chefs, whether its the owner of The Beef itself which was the inspiration for The Bear, Matty Matheson as Fak, or famous chefs like Rene Redzepi.

I imagine another big vibe for Bear fans is food fetishization, which is not really my thing, but I do love some of the food/kitchen stuff, particularly the stopwatch/race against time stuff, like Tina's battle to cook a pasta dish within 3 minutes in Season 4.

But it's the music for me. One funny little thought I  had watching Season 4, on the episode they wisely included some Wilco again (a studio outtake of I'm the Man Who Loves You), the song played over the credits was Stay Young by Oasis. Stay Young, of all the Oasis songs, the one I go on about being the last, lost Oasis classic. So after my own heart, it might almost have been curated by me.

Of course, it wasn't. But my idle fancy, which I last had when watching the TV version of One Day, when every track seemed to be directly taken from the compilation tapes I was making in the early 2000s, was "wouldn't it be funny if someone read my blog".

Of course, no one reads my blog. Occasionally, there are bursts off quite large reader numbers, but I've always presumed they were bots or something, but funny if they were people who do soundtracks for TV shows ...

If that is the case, I will only believe it if I hear Bryte Side by The Pernice Brothers on the soundtrack to a hit show about cricket ...